Keith Ellison to take oath on Koran?

Recently elected to fill the vacancy that is being left by Martin Sabo, who is retiring after his 28 years in Congress, is Democrat Keith Ellison who will be representing Minnesota’s 5th District, when he is sworn in January 2007.

Mr. Ellison will make history as the first Muslim to ever sit in Congress. So…what is the problem some people ask???

Well, other than Mr. Ellison’s stellar records as a “citizen” and state representative, by having his drivers license suspended (he couldn’t remember how many times) due to failure to pay multiple fines and traffic tickets, to the IRS putting a lien on his home for late and back taxes between 1992 and 2000 (which was later paid in excess of $18,000) to his campaign finance violations and misinformation (from the soon to be “cleanest congress in history)…….what other problems could there be??

First off, Mr. Ellison totally downplayed his Muslim faith, never bringing it to the forefront and only mentioned it briefly when asked a specific question. Call me whatever you wish, but in these pre 9/11 days, when all over the world Muslim terrorists are shouting “Death to America”, “kill the infidels”, etc..I feel this IS an issue!!

Mr. Ellison received funds and support from CAIR (Council for American-Islamic Relations) who IS known for post 9/11 ties to terrorism and in which many of the CAIR officials were convicted of, or pled guilty to, support of Islamic terrorists!! Mr. Ellison was then to appear at CAIR’s banquet as a guest speaker, but apparently, back-peddled out of it!

Mr. Ellison appears to have been less than honest in his dealing with the Nation of Islam and and in his “disagreeable” dealings..for example:

At a rally for the Million Man March held at the University of Minnesota, Ellison appeared onstage with Khalid Abdul Muhammad, who ran true to form: According to a contemporaneous Star Tribune article, “If words were swords, the chests of Jews, gays and whites would be pierced.”

In a November 6, 1995, column for the Minneapolis periodical Insight News, Ellison wrote under the name “Keith X Ellison.” He condemned a Star Tribune editorial cartoon that was critical of Farrakhan as a role model for blacks because of his anti-Semitism. Ellison argued to the contrary.

Then, in February 1997, Ellison appeared as a local spokesman for the Nation of Islam with the last name “Muhammad.” ….published in the Minneapolis Spokesman-Recorder, Elli son said:

We stand by the truth contained in the remarks attributed to [Ms. Jackson]……..Ellison’s May 28 letter acknowledges only that others supported Jackson’s alleged statement in that controversy while falsely denying that he himself did so.

…in 1998, when he ran for the DFL nomination for state representative as “Keith Ellison-Muhammad.” In a contemporaneous article on his candidacy in the Insight News, Ellison is reported still defending Louis Farrakhan.

Ellison says now that he broke with the Nation of Islam when “it became clear to me that their message of empowerment intertwined with more negative messages.” However, Ellison himself was the purveyor of the Nation of Islam’s noxious party line in his every public utterance touching on related issues over the course of a decade. Moreover, Ellison’s unsavory associations were not limited to the Nation of Islam.

Perhaps the lowest moment in Minneapolis’s history was the September 1992 execution-style murder of police officer Jerry Haaf. Haaf was shot in the back as he took a coffee break at a restaurant in south Minneapolis. The murder was a gang hit performed by four members of the city’s Vice Lords gang. The leader of the Vice Lords was Sharif Willis, a convicted murderer who had been released from prison and who sought respectability as a responsible gang leader from gullible municipal authorities while operating a gang front called United for Peace.

Within a month of Haaf’s murder, Ellison appeared with Willis supporting the United for Peace gang front. In October 1992, Ellison helped organize a demonstration against Minneapolis police that included United for Peace.

Ellison publicly supported the Haaf murder defendants. In February 1993, he spoke at a demonstration for one of them during his trial. Ellison led the crowd assembled at the courthouse in a chant that was ominous in the context of Haaf’s cold-blooded murder: “We don’t get no justice, you don’t get no peace.”

The various themes of Ellison’s public commitments and associations all came together in a February 2000 speech he gave at a fundraising event sponsored by the Minnesota chapter of the far-left National Lawyers Guild, on whose steering committee he had served. The event was a fundraiser for former Symbionese Liberation Army member Kathleen Soliah after her apprehension in St. Paul (under the name “Sara Jane Olson”) for the attempted murder of Los Angeles police officers in 1975.

Ellison weirdly referred to Soliah/ Olson as a “black gang member” (she is white) and thus a victim of government persecution. ….He also spoke favorably of cop killers Mumia Abu-Jamal and Assata Shakur. (Shakur has been on the lam in Cuba since 1984; last year she was placed on the FBI’s domestic terrorists list with a one million dollar reward for her capture.)

After THAT background, we now have Mr. Ellison stating that he will not take his oath of office on the Bible, but on the Koran!!

I’m sorry, but does that not make anyone nervous whatsoever!!?? We have Islamic terrorist spouting the Koran and yelling “Allah Akbar” before blowing people up, beheading people, etc!! Now, I am NOT SAYING that Ellison is or has condonned those types of actions, BUT, with the “ties” to CAIR and the Nation of Islam I am a bit more cautious!

Also, I do NOT believe that the oath of office to protect this country should be taken except on the Bible…the Koran is unacceptable!! This is AMERICA and Ellison is swearing to PROTECT THIS COUNTRY…NOT Islam! It does make one wonder what side would he be on if it came down to “brass tacks”!!!

Devotees of multiculturalism and political correctness who do not see how damaging to the fabric of American civilization it is to allow Ellison to choose his own book need only imagine a racist elected to Congress. Would they allow him to choose Hitler’s “Mein Kampf,” the Nazis’ bible, for his oath? And if not, why not? On what grounds will those defending Ellison’s right to choose his favorite book deny that same right to a racist who is elected to public office?

…But for all of American history, Jews elected to public office have taken their oath on the Bible, even though they do not believe in the New Testament, and the many secular elected officials have not believed in the Old Testament either. …. Nor has one Mormon official demanded to put his hand on the Book of Mormon. And it is hard to imagine a scientologist being allowed to take his oath of office on a copy of “Dianetics” by L. Ron Hubbard.

When all elected officials take their oaths of office with their hands on the very same book, they all affirm that some unifying value system underlies American civilization. If Keith Ellison is allowed to change that, he will be doing more damage to the unity of America and to the value system that has formed this country than the terrorists of 9-11.

When does political correctness end? This is America, and although we are made up of many cultures and backgrounds, we are to come together as ONE NATION if our country is to survive!!!

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11 Responses to Keith Ellison to take oath on Koran?

Now I don’t make a secret of the fact that I am not a big fan of Islam. Indeed, it concerns me that more Muslims and Islamic institutions don’t stand up and take a hardline stance against terrorism. And I…

An oath is not required either, as the Constitution in all instances includes the option of affirming rather than swearing and oath.

Why are so many Americans (especially the right wing pundit types) so ignorant of their own Constitution and traditions?

What happened to the principle of religious liberty? It’s not really liberty if one can be coerced into conforming to a belief one doesn’t share, is it? Prager’s outrage is simple bigotry, nothing more, nothing less. It’s disgusting and un-American.

Yes we all should be nervous about Ellison taking an oath on the Koran instead of the Bible. But, I’m afraid that there’s little we can do about it. It brings up many interesting questions. I believe that our founding fathers never envisioned a time when America would not be ruled by Judeo-Christian values. However, we are faced with the First Amendment – “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;..” Regardless of how the original founders of this country would have interpreted this event with regard to the First Amendment, we are living in a multicultural nation now, and with the activist Supreme Court . . . well, it doesn’t look like there’s anything to prevent this from happening.

Many people just aren’t happy about having a Muslim congressman. Too bad – he was democratically elected by the voting citizens of Minnesota’s 5th District. The only people with a legal say in the matter have already spoken, and there’s no room in the process for others to whine just because of his religion.

First, no one is “whining” as you state due to his religion! People are concerned, and rightly so, on what THAT religion represents when it comes to protecting our country!!

The controversy was NOT a lie “ginned up” by Dennis Prager…Ellison apparently gave a “video blog” interview to Amanda Congdon at Amanda across America, who has done video blog interviews with numerous people and asked:

“what would it be like to be the first member of congress as a Muslim and will you be sworn in on the Quran?”

His response: “Well I hadn’t really thought about what I was going to use to be sworn in but I assume I would use the Quran. It sounds like a good idea to me.”

It was also apparently reported in some of the Arab newspapers.

Members of the House are administered the “oath of office” en masse by the newly sworn Speaker. This IS, by the way, after a prayer by the chaplain and the Pledge of Allegiance!! Now whether Ellison chooses to carry the Koran at the time, or use it as a “photo op”, I am STILL against it!!

It’s funny. Most of the patriarchs in the Bible are polygamists, some having as many as 700 wives and 300 concubines, they considered women to be objects, Dueteronomy 28 says a rape victim must marry her rapist, Lot tried to hand his daughters off to a horny mob of rapists, then his own daughters got him drunk and screwed him, Yahweh orders Moses to invade Canaan and kill everyone there and steal their land (this AFTER saying “thou shalt not kill”), in fact Moses’ soldiers kill the men and then Moses gets pissed because they left the women and chilren, in the New Testament Paul says women are inferior to men and that slaves should obey their master, etc. etc. etc. The Bible is filled with more violence, sexism, racism, slavery, polygamy, incest, and otherwise depraved stories and ideas than almost any other book on the planet.

Yet you think it’s this wonderful book of truth and justice and superior to all others.

Wacky. I’m assuming like most Americans you’ve never actually read the Bible.

“People are concerned, and rightly so, on what THAT religion represents when it comes to protecting our country!!”

As I already said, The People – the voting members of the Minnesota 5th – have already spoken on the issue. Its cool with them. Case closed.

Say a Christian was elected to some conservative district in Texas, (a shocking development, I’m sure) and people from elsewhere in the country got upset that, as Ryan stated above, there are legions of downright ahborrent passages in the Bible unfit for any moral man or woman to believe. You would be first in line demanding that the new member of congress has already been elected, that his religion demonstrated the will of the people, etc.

“Yet you think it’s this wonderful book (the Bible) of truth and justice and superior to all others”

In a discussion about the Bible vs the Koran and how each relates to the culture they reprent TODAY, you are actually criticizing the Bible?

I have read both the Bible and the Koran while it is obvious you have only been fed the parts of the Bible that fit your ideology. It is further obvious that you have not even come within smelling distance of the Koran, much less read it.

Interesting. In the past, American politicians and statesmen had been swearing on the bible for hundreds of years while ironically enforcing slavery, restricting peoples civil rights, and doing a lot more harm than good to the system. Swearing on the bible didn’t stop them from the Japanese Internment during world war II. I could go on. If its american tradition that everyone’s so worried about, traditions change people. And thank god they do, we’re usually better for it. Many of my friends from the south would agree. The world is so much more global now, and not everyone follows the bible, the sooner Washington realizes this the better (majority of the world, actually doesn’t). Change is good…just a matter of time before we get a President who isn’t white..tradition??